Another Unfamiliar Sound

Rain!  We did have our first rain a couple of weeks ago, but this was a full fledged thunderstorm so it was the rain pounding on the roof accompanied by thunder sound that we haven't heard in months.  Of course, it happened to occur when we needed to go pick up Abigail from the movies.  Fortunately, John offered to go with me because - yeesh - it was pouring and the roads were full of water.  One road near our house has very poor drainage (and of course no street lights) so it is always scary in the rain.  It is amazing how foreign it feels to have rain and that soon it will feel very commonplace!

Ah! the Sweet Sound of Silence

Since my last post our generator has been running 24/7.  The reason that we have a generator is of course due to unreliable power here in Zim.  Power cuts are at times a daily occurrence and when that is the case we are most thankful that we have a generator running.

However, in the past two months the issue has not been a lack of Zesa (local power company) but apparent surges in that power.  And our generator is set to come on when there are surges to protect the US Government appliances in our house (and of course our electrical devices as well).  Despite numerous visits from Embassy personnel and their attempts to get Zesa to figure out the problem our generator continued on - with it's accompanying noise and smell (and of course, cost).

This morning yet another Zesa team came and this time seem to have found the problem on the property next door.  And so, for the first time since we've returned back from the US in August it is actually quiet.  The sound of silence can be amazing!

Breaking the Silence

I'm not sure who's reading this blog - but apologies go out to any of you who check it regularly for the almost 3 months with no posts.  Now that we're starting our third year here (haven't lived in a house that long since 2004!) a lot of things will be annual occurances, so I probably will be posting less often.

But there's another reason that I might not get to post so much:

Abigail is doing 9th grade at home.  This was a VERY hard decision because she really enjoyed the social interaction at HIS.  But for a variety of reasons, we decided the best thing would be for her to attend part-time.  We made this request of the school during the second semester last year, and much to our dissappointment, we were turned down.  Happily, the school will continue to allow the girls to particpate in after school activities.

While Abigail is taking many online, teacher based courses (Algebra 2, Spanish 4, Biology and Literature), she is not doing a complete school program.  So, that combined with her need to get out and about every day is going to make life a bit interesting in the coming school year.  She started school two weeks ago and so far is enjoying her course work but does miss being with her friends every day.

Of course, we also have a high school senior who is applying to college.  Happily, Arianna's school doesn't start until after Labor Day so she has been able to spend the last couple of weeks relaxing and getting a head start on applications.

This coming week both girls will be busy with some of those "annual occurance" events.  Abigail is at the National Musicamp out in the country (the HIS kids also skip a week of school to go) and Arianna will return to a day camp that is run by the local churches for 15-25 year olds (Week of Transformation - otherwise known as WOT).

We are definitely getting settled back into our lives here after our "home leave" summer in the US.  Hopefully I'll get to post a few high lights of that in the future.

8th Grade Commencement

 

The Commencement ceremony for 8th grade took place yesterday at Harare International School. The kids planned and mced the event which was just delightful.  There was the 8th grade "Orchestra" - about a dozen kids who play put together a tune with a little help from the orchestra director.  Pretty impressive for a class of 28 kids - many of whom move around a lot and don't always have a chance to learn an instrument.  There was also a Marimba ensemble - made up mostly of kids who had been at HIS for many years.

The students were presented with Certificates (can you see Abigail's little girl photos in the background above?) and gave each of their parents a small gift and note of thanks.  After the ceremony there was a reception in the Band Room.  The parent committe, headed by my friend Yifat, did a great job of decorating and organizing the reception.  

HIFA 2014

I have to admit that I was underwhelmed by Harare Festival of the Arts 2013.  It is the well anticpated week of the year in the international community so many of the people that we know book lots of tickets for the six day event which features music, dance and theater performances by artists from all over the world.  The girls and I picked out about 4 events but I wasn't really impressed with any of them.

So, when the time came for HIFA this year I wasn't super eager to book too many things.  But there were a number of interesting looking shows and the kids were interested in seeing a string quartet from South Africa that was performing a piece they just started to work on.  So, we again picked a few events.  I have to say that now I understand the fuss much better.  Most of the shows we went to were for the most part great (there was one pop concert that I could have lived without but that was the exception).  My favorite was a Canadian guitarist of Iranian descent.  Not only was his playing amazing, his life story was equally amazing (and well told).

Theater Opening

As I mentioned in a previous post, Sixteen Strings was asked to play at a movie theater opening.  They were quite excited to do this and worked hard in the middle of a very busy time to be sure that they were ready.

Here the girls are playing, and if you look at the dignitaries sitting in the chairs, you will see the Vice President in the yellow dress.  She gave the opening speech.

While the theater costs almost as much as the US (unlike the other two theaters here which are about half the price), it is quite nice.  And also in the area where we live, so ends up being the theater of choice for mostly that reason.  Abigail has been there several times to see a movie and I went with her once.

April's Funeral

After the months of February and March that were so busy, April was the month where life kind of stood still to the point that we felt like we have no idea where it went.  It actually started back on a night in March.  We were in the middle of all the Eisteddfod craziness and the girls were playing at a big opening of a movie theater when I got a text message from John saying that his dad had suddenly passed away from a massive heart attack.  He was in good health (you may recall that I mentioned that in a post about December when we last visited John's parents) so it was quite a shock.

At the time, my parents were here in the middle of a two week visit that was meant to include a holiday to the lake.  We quickly decided that we all wanted to go to the US for the funeral, but took a couple of days to sort out the details.  In the end, the funeral was delayed for a week and we were able to both go to the lake and get some plane tickets that were normally priced (some departure dates were twice as much as others!).  I am so thankful that we were able to go to the US to be with family and celebrate John's dad's life.

John's mom with ALL of her grandchildren - only the second time that they've all been together!

Happy that they are all together, sad that there is no Grandpa with them.  He will be very missed - especially as the three oldest granddaughters are all to be married in the next 13 months.